28
Apr
2026
Watch
The Commission’s 2025 Rule of Law report (debate)
Mr President, Commissioner, the rule of law is not a technical debate or an institutional ritual, it is the line between democracy and the abuse of power. It is what protects those who investigate corruption, those who go out to demonstrate, those who defend legitimate and democratic political ideas, those who need an independent judge and those who want to be informed with a free press. That's security: democratic security. This report reminds us that when counterweights are weakened, when journalists are pressured, when civil society is suffocated or the attack on rights is normalised, we are not facing isolated attacks; We are facing a democratic deterioration, and Europe cannot treat that as a footnote. To defend the rule of law is not to defend an abstraction, it is to defend the Europe we want to be, a Europe based on human rights.